Lost & Found
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This version of the story has a map, the 'turtle' video, and still extracts from it:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldne ... yssey.html
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldne ... yssey.html
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Bought at a garage sale for $45, the photographs worth more than $200m
By Stephen Foley in New York
Wednesday, 28 July 2010
Rick Norsigian, a Californian antique buff, knew exactly what he was looking for when he went rooting through a Fresno garage in 2000. He was looking for a vintage barber's chair, to add to his eclectic collection of old telephone switchboards, petrol pumps and aeroplane propellers. But when the chair turned out to be a dud, he chanced upon something that changed his life: two boxes of antique glass negatives which, a Beverly Hills art appraiser declared yesterday, were the work of Ansel Adams, the father of American photography.
Mr Norsigian, a construction workers and painter, had bargained his garage sale counterparty from $75 down to $45 for the lot. Now it seems the collection is worth at least $200m (£129m). "When I heard that [figure], I got a little weak," he said.
Unveiling the photographs at a Beverly Hills gallery yesterday, after years of scepticism from the art world, an attorney, Arnold Peter, said a team of experts had finally concluded the 65 negatives were the early work of Adams, most likely taken between 1919 and the early 1930s and rescued from a fire in 1937. The photographer declared himself heartbroken at the fire, which destroyed an estimated one-third of his work.
Adams's black and white pictures of the rugged beauty of the American West are now a staple of US greetings cards and posters. His work not only helped establish photography as an art equivalent to painting or music, but also stoked the nascent national parks movement in the US. A retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art in New York in 2003 to celebrate what would have been his 100th birthday the previous year declared him "one of the great photographers of the 20th century and also one of the best-loved spokesmen for the obligations we owe to the natural world".
When Mr Norsigian and his friends noted the similarities between his negatives and Adams's famed photographs of Yosemite National Park, he decided to hire Mr Peter to investigate further, and the pair declared the results of that investigation yesterday. "You look at these photographs and they take your breath away," Mr Norsigian declared. "But it is even more meaningful and rewarding to finally have the leading experts confirm what I believed in my heart when I saw the images for the first time."
Handwriting experts confirmed that writing on the envelopes in which the negatives were found belonged to Adams's wife, Virginia, Mr Peter said. A meteorological expert compared one of Adams's most famous photographs with one found in the negatives and by looking at the cloud formation, the snow on the mountains and the shadow cast by a tree, determined that the two photographs were taken on the same day at approximately the same time.
"There is no definitive authority charged with authenticating photographs," Mr Peter said. "And unlike a painting there is no signature linking the work to the artist. So, we decided to apply the highest possible evidentiary standard we could think of. Every individual who has actually examined all the evidence we have gathered has come to the same conclusion – these are, in fact, the works of Ansel Adams.
"These photographs are really the missing link. They really fill the void in Ansel Adams' early career."
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-enter ... 36902.html
By Stephen Foley in New York
Wednesday, 28 July 2010
Rick Norsigian, a Californian antique buff, knew exactly what he was looking for when he went rooting through a Fresno garage in 2000. He was looking for a vintage barber's chair, to add to his eclectic collection of old telephone switchboards, petrol pumps and aeroplane propellers. But when the chair turned out to be a dud, he chanced upon something that changed his life: two boxes of antique glass negatives which, a Beverly Hills art appraiser declared yesterday, were the work of Ansel Adams, the father of American photography.
Mr Norsigian, a construction workers and painter, had bargained his garage sale counterparty from $75 down to $45 for the lot. Now it seems the collection is worth at least $200m (£129m). "When I heard that [figure], I got a little weak," he said.
Unveiling the photographs at a Beverly Hills gallery yesterday, after years of scepticism from the art world, an attorney, Arnold Peter, said a team of experts had finally concluded the 65 negatives were the early work of Adams, most likely taken between 1919 and the early 1930s and rescued from a fire in 1937. The photographer declared himself heartbroken at the fire, which destroyed an estimated one-third of his work.
Adams's black and white pictures of the rugged beauty of the American West are now a staple of US greetings cards and posters. His work not only helped establish photography as an art equivalent to painting or music, but also stoked the nascent national parks movement in the US. A retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art in New York in 2003 to celebrate what would have been his 100th birthday the previous year declared him "one of the great photographers of the 20th century and also one of the best-loved spokesmen for the obligations we owe to the natural world".
When Mr Norsigian and his friends noted the similarities between his negatives and Adams's famed photographs of Yosemite National Park, he decided to hire Mr Peter to investigate further, and the pair declared the results of that investigation yesterday. "You look at these photographs and they take your breath away," Mr Norsigian declared. "But it is even more meaningful and rewarding to finally have the leading experts confirm what I believed in my heart when I saw the images for the first time."
Handwriting experts confirmed that writing on the envelopes in which the negatives were found belonged to Adams's wife, Virginia, Mr Peter said. A meteorological expert compared one of Adams's most famous photographs with one found in the negatives and by looking at the cloud formation, the snow on the mountains and the shadow cast by a tree, determined that the two photographs were taken on the same day at approximately the same time.
"There is no definitive authority charged with authenticating photographs," Mr Peter said. "And unlike a painting there is no signature linking the work to the artist. So, we decided to apply the highest possible evidentiary standard we could think of. Every individual who has actually examined all the evidence we have gathered has come to the same conclusion – these are, in fact, the works of Ansel Adams.
"These photographs are really the missing link. They really fill the void in Ansel Adams' early career."
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-enter ... 36902.html
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Lost Arctic ship found 150 years after it was abandoned
The ship credited with discovering the Northwest Passage, has been discovered in good condition after being abandoned more than 150 years ago in the Arctic ice.
Published: 10:53PM BST 28 Jul 2010
Canadian Archeologists were able to take sonar images of HMS Investigator at the weekend not long after they arrived at the remote Mercy Bay site in the Northwest Territories, Marc-Andre Bernier of Parks Canada said on Wednesday.
The Investigator was the British ship that was sent to search for two lost vessels that were part of Sir John Franklin’s ill-fated 1845 Royal Navy expedition to discover the Northwest Passage linking the Atlantic to the Pacific through Canada’s Arctic Archipelago.
“This is definitely of the utmost importance,” said Mr Bernier, chief of the underwater archaeology service with Parks Canada, the federal body conducting the Arctic survey.
“This was the ship that confirmed and nailed the discovery of that passage.”
He said one of the other archeologists had likened the discovery to finding one of Columbus’s ships.
The icy waters have helped preserve the ship, which is sitting upright on the sea floor in about 11 metres (36 feet) of water and not far from the location where it was last documented in 1854.
The wreck had been difficult to find because of its remote location off Bank’s Island and also because the waters are usually very icy. This year, the team had an ice free area to work in.
“It’s in surprisingly good condition,” said Mr Bernier. “The reason we were so lucky in a way was because the ship had not moved too much from the place it was abandoned.”
Archeologists plan to take more images this week from a small inflatable boat they are working with. They hope to use a robot equipped with cameras, similar to equipment now being used in the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, to learn about the ship.
The graves of three Royal Navy sailors, who died in 1853 of scurvy, were also discovered. The British government has been notified of the find, Canadian Environment Minister Jim Prentice told Reuters from Mercy Bay.
The Investigator was deployed in 1850 with a 66-man crew, but was eventually abandoned after being locked in the grip of Arctic ice for two winters. The crew, led by Captain Robert John LeMesurier McClure, left behind a cache of equipment and provisions on the shore of what is now part of Aulavik National Park.
Mr Prentice, who was scheduled to stay at the site for several more days, said the discovery of the ship and the artefacts on shore formed an “incredibly rich treasure trove.”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldne ... doned.html
The ship credited with discovering the Northwest Passage, has been discovered in good condition after being abandoned more than 150 years ago in the Arctic ice.
Published: 10:53PM BST 28 Jul 2010
Canadian Archeologists were able to take sonar images of HMS Investigator at the weekend not long after they arrived at the remote Mercy Bay site in the Northwest Territories, Marc-Andre Bernier of Parks Canada said on Wednesday.
The Investigator was the British ship that was sent to search for two lost vessels that were part of Sir John Franklin’s ill-fated 1845 Royal Navy expedition to discover the Northwest Passage linking the Atlantic to the Pacific through Canada’s Arctic Archipelago.
“This is definitely of the utmost importance,” said Mr Bernier, chief of the underwater archaeology service with Parks Canada, the federal body conducting the Arctic survey.
“This was the ship that confirmed and nailed the discovery of that passage.”
He said one of the other archeologists had likened the discovery to finding one of Columbus’s ships.
The icy waters have helped preserve the ship, which is sitting upright on the sea floor in about 11 metres (36 feet) of water and not far from the location where it was last documented in 1854.
The wreck had been difficult to find because of its remote location off Bank’s Island and also because the waters are usually very icy. This year, the team had an ice free area to work in.
“It’s in surprisingly good condition,” said Mr Bernier. “The reason we were so lucky in a way was because the ship had not moved too much from the place it was abandoned.”
Archeologists plan to take more images this week from a small inflatable boat they are working with. They hope to use a robot equipped with cameras, similar to equipment now being used in the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, to learn about the ship.
The graves of three Royal Navy sailors, who died in 1853 of scurvy, were also discovered. The British government has been notified of the find, Canadian Environment Minister Jim Prentice told Reuters from Mercy Bay.
The Investigator was deployed in 1850 with a 66-man crew, but was eventually abandoned after being locked in the grip of Arctic ice for two winters. The crew, led by Captain Robert John LeMesurier McClure, left behind a cache of equipment and provisions on the shore of what is now part of Aulavik National Park.
Mr Prentice, who was scheduled to stay at the site for several more days, said the discovery of the ship and the artefacts on shore formed an “incredibly rich treasure trove.”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldne ... doned.html
ramonmercado
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Lost tapes of classic British television found in the US
Treasure trove of drama from the 'golden age of television' discovered in Library of Congress after more than 40 years
Vanessa Thorpe arts and media correspondent The Observer, Sunday 12 September 2010
A rediscovered haul of television dramas that has been lost for 40 years or more is set to change the way we think about many of Britain's biggest acting stars.
The extraordinary cache of televised plays – described by experts as "an embarrassment of riches" – features performances from a cavalcade of postwar British stars. The list includes John Gielgud, Sean Connery, Gemma Jones, Dorothy Tutin, Robert Stephens, Susannah York, John Le Mesurier, Peggy Ashcroft, Patrick Troughton, David Hemmings, Leonard Rossiter, Michael Gambon, Maggie Smith and Jane Asher. The tapes have been unearthed in the Library of Congress in Washington DC.
After months of negotiation, the library and the New York-based public service television station WNET have agreed to allow the British Film Institute in London to showcase the highlights in November, an occasion that is certain to generate intense nostalgia for what many critics maintain was the golden age of television.
A hint of what is to come appears in the joint BFI and National Film Theatre guide for November, which refers to the forthcoming "Missing Believed Wiped" event and mentions the discovery of hundreds of hours of British TV drama. The tapes are understood to have been sent out to WNET for broadcast and later stored in the TV station's collection inside the Library of Congress, where they were recently catalogued with British assistance.
They were originally broadcast by the BBC and the independent television companies Granada and Associated-Rediffusion between 1957 and 1970. News of their rediscovery was inadvertently leaked to the public in an events bulletin put out at the weekend. The programmes include works by Shakespeare, Chekhov and Ibsen, as well as new work written for weekly shows such as The Wednesday Play and Thursday Theatre.
Among other gems found in the archives are a BBC production of Jean Anouilh's version of Sophocles' Antigone starring Dorothy Tutin and David McCallum, that made the front cover of the Radio Times in 1959 but has not been seen since. Notes inside the listings magazine confirm the production was Tutin's BBC television debut and describe her as the "leading young actress of the contemporary scene". A BBC production of Henrik Ibsen's Rosmersholm from 1965 stars Peggy Ashcroft with a supporting cast including John Laurie.
Maggie Smith and Robert Stephens star opposite each other as Beatrice and Benedick in a 1967 production of Much Ado About Nothing recorded for the BBC, while Sean Connery appears with Dorothy Tutin in a rare BBC Sunday Night Theatre production of Anouilh's Colombe from 1960.
The earliest rediscovered recording is a 1957 production of Ibsen's The Wild Duck, directed for ITV by Charles Crichton and starring Tutin opposite Emlyn Williams and Michael Gough. The library's hoard also includes finds of interest for social reasons. A production of Twelfth Night, starring John Wood as Malvolio, was made by Rediffusion for its schools programming in the afternoons. It was a 75-minute reduction of the play and was broadcast at the end of a nine-part series that examined the work's cultural and historical background.
"Negotiations to secure the release of these dramas have been going on for some time and we have been holding on to the information until the time is right," said a spokesman for the BFI. "It is very exciting, but we don't have all the information yet."
etc...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/tv-and-radio/ ... television
Treasure trove of drama from the 'golden age of television' discovered in Library of Congress after more than 40 years
Vanessa Thorpe arts and media correspondent The Observer, Sunday 12 September 2010
A rediscovered haul of television dramas that has been lost for 40 years or more is set to change the way we think about many of Britain's biggest acting stars.
The extraordinary cache of televised plays – described by experts as "an embarrassment of riches" – features performances from a cavalcade of postwar British stars. The list includes John Gielgud, Sean Connery, Gemma Jones, Dorothy Tutin, Robert Stephens, Susannah York, John Le Mesurier, Peggy Ashcroft, Patrick Troughton, David Hemmings, Leonard Rossiter, Michael Gambon, Maggie Smith and Jane Asher. The tapes have been unearthed in the Library of Congress in Washington DC.
After months of negotiation, the library and the New York-based public service television station WNET have agreed to allow the British Film Institute in London to showcase the highlights in November, an occasion that is certain to generate intense nostalgia for what many critics maintain was the golden age of television.
A hint of what is to come appears in the joint BFI and National Film Theatre guide for November, which refers to the forthcoming "Missing Believed Wiped" event and mentions the discovery of hundreds of hours of British TV drama. The tapes are understood to have been sent out to WNET for broadcast and later stored in the TV station's collection inside the Library of Congress, where they were recently catalogued with British assistance.
They were originally broadcast by the BBC and the independent television companies Granada and Associated-Rediffusion between 1957 and 1970. News of their rediscovery was inadvertently leaked to the public in an events bulletin put out at the weekend. The programmes include works by Shakespeare, Chekhov and Ibsen, as well as new work written for weekly shows such as The Wednesday Play and Thursday Theatre.
Among other gems found in the archives are a BBC production of Jean Anouilh's version of Sophocles' Antigone starring Dorothy Tutin and David McCallum, that made the front cover of the Radio Times in 1959 but has not been seen since. Notes inside the listings magazine confirm the production was Tutin's BBC television debut and describe her as the "leading young actress of the contemporary scene". A BBC production of Henrik Ibsen's Rosmersholm from 1965 stars Peggy Ashcroft with a supporting cast including John Laurie.
Maggie Smith and Robert Stephens star opposite each other as Beatrice and Benedick in a 1967 production of Much Ado About Nothing recorded for the BBC, while Sean Connery appears with Dorothy Tutin in a rare BBC Sunday Night Theatre production of Anouilh's Colombe from 1960.
The earliest rediscovered recording is a 1957 production of Ibsen's The Wild Duck, directed for ITV by Charles Crichton and starring Tutin opposite Emlyn Williams and Michael Gough. The library's hoard also includes finds of interest for social reasons. A production of Twelfth Night, starring John Wood as Malvolio, was made by Rediffusion for its schools programming in the afternoons. It was a 75-minute reduction of the play and was broadcast at the end of a nine-part series that examined the work's cultural and historical background.
"Negotiations to secure the release of these dramas have been going on for some time and we have been holding on to the information until the time is right," said a spokesman for the BFI. "It is very exciting, but we don't have all the information yet."
etc...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/tv-and-radio/ ... television
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They're here:
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=telegoons&aq=f :madeyes:
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WW1 sketches show soldier's life in trenches
Revealing sketches and drawings of life in the trenches have been discovered in a First World War soldier's diary after lying hidden for 90 years.
Published: 7:30AM BST 15 Sep 2010
Lieutenant Kenneth Wootton's diary give an astonishing insight into the horror of major WWI battles and includes ink drawings of tanks and battle movements.
Lt Wootton, who was awarded the MC for conspicuous gallantry and devotion to duty, kept a diary for most of the war - from 1915 until 1917, when he was sent home to England after being injured in an explosion.
But the sketches have been untouched for more than 90 years - until the soldier's great granddaughter inherited a mass of old books and papers and discovered the diary lying inside.
The 120-page journal presents a vivid story of life on the front line of the trenches - and the never-before seen glimpse into life for the 1/21 Battn London Regt Tank Corps will excite scholars of military history.
Lt Wootton even describes a Christmas truce between the British and German soldiers in December 1916 - where both sides stopped firing at each other to enjoy a festive dinner.
In one picture from the book, a British 'Tommy' soldier can be seen staring out over the trenches without fear of being shot.
The diary reads: "Christmas Day 1916, Ypres: Distance between the line was 100 yards. Had an excellent Christmas dinner in a dug out, turkey, Christmas pudding, mince pies, fruit and champagne. Both sides stopped. Did patrol from midnight till 3am and felt very merry." 8)
As a tank operator, Wootton experienced the full horror of trench warfare, and fought in the Third Battle of Ypres - one of the most notorious clashes of the war.
He wrote: " The German front line had been smashed almost out of recognition as we passed through shell holes and most were filled with filthy water and bodies.
"I found one of our own infantry lying wounded with a bad gash in his head.
"I gave him some water and told him the stretcher bearers were coming up. I hope it was true.
"I dodged him but I was obliged to drive over a dead German. I shall never forget the sight of his face after it had been pushed in to the mud by a 40 tonne tank. The awful mud made it a hopeless mess."
The diary is expected to fetch more than £3,000 when it is auctioned off at the end of September.
Auctioneer Charles Hanson said: "The diary and Wootton's heroic tales provide a fascinating insight in to the realism of terror in the trenches during WWI.
"His story is poignant, and even jovial at point as he recounts the good humour that saw the British boys through the war.
"It is a tale of survival and success in the British army.
"We hope the diary will be purchased by a national institution and made available for the public to enjoy the adventure Wootton had through WWI."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstop ... nches.html
Revealing sketches and drawings of life in the trenches have been discovered in a First World War soldier's diary after lying hidden for 90 years.
Published: 7:30AM BST 15 Sep 2010
Lieutenant Kenneth Wootton's diary give an astonishing insight into the horror of major WWI battles and includes ink drawings of tanks and battle movements.
Lt Wootton, who was awarded the MC for conspicuous gallantry and devotion to duty, kept a diary for most of the war - from 1915 until 1917, when he was sent home to England after being injured in an explosion.
But the sketches have been untouched for more than 90 years - until the soldier's great granddaughter inherited a mass of old books and papers and discovered the diary lying inside.
The 120-page journal presents a vivid story of life on the front line of the trenches - and the never-before seen glimpse into life for the 1/21 Battn London Regt Tank Corps will excite scholars of military history.
Lt Wootton even describes a Christmas truce between the British and German soldiers in December 1916 - where both sides stopped firing at each other to enjoy a festive dinner.
In one picture from the book, a British 'Tommy' soldier can be seen staring out over the trenches without fear of being shot.
The diary reads: "Christmas Day 1916, Ypres: Distance between the line was 100 yards. Had an excellent Christmas dinner in a dug out, turkey, Christmas pudding, mince pies, fruit and champagne. Both sides stopped. Did patrol from midnight till 3am and felt very merry." 8)
As a tank operator, Wootton experienced the full horror of trench warfare, and fought in the Third Battle of Ypres - one of the most notorious clashes of the war.
He wrote: " The German front line had been smashed almost out of recognition as we passed through shell holes and most were filled with filthy water and bodies.
"I found one of our own infantry lying wounded with a bad gash in his head.
"I gave him some water and told him the stretcher bearers were coming up. I hope it was true.
"I dodged him but I was obliged to drive over a dead German. I shall never forget the sight of his face after it had been pushed in to the mud by a 40 tonne tank. The awful mud made it a hopeless mess."
The diary is expected to fetch more than £3,000 when it is auctioned off at the end of September.
Auctioneer Charles Hanson said: "The diary and Wootton's heroic tales provide a fascinating insight in to the realism of terror in the trenches during WWI.
"His story is poignant, and even jovial at point as he recounts the good humour that saw the British boys through the war.
"It is a tale of survival and success in the British army.
"We hope the diary will be purchased by a national institution and made available for the public to enjoy the adventure Wootton had through WWI."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstop ... nches.html
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Letters shed light on bitter rivalries behind discovery of DNA double helix
Newly found letters between Francis Crick and Maurice Wilkins illuminate the race to determine the structure of DNA
Ian Sample, science correspondent guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 29 September 2010 18.01 BST
A cache of missing letters, postcards and other documents belonging to Francis Crick, the scientist who helped crack the structure of DNA in the 1950s, has been discovered by researchers in America.
The nine archive boxes of lost correspondence include letters that reveal the exasperation and strained relationships at the heart of one of the greatest discoveries of modern science.
Crick died in 2004. Almost all of his early correspondence was thought to have been thrown away by an over-efficient secretary at Cambridge University, where Crick and James Watson created the first double helix model of DNA in 1953.
A report in the journal Nature reveals that the letters were not discarded, but had become mixed up with papers belonging to another scientist, Sydney Brenner, who shared an office with Crick for 20 years and recently donated his own archive materials to the library at Cold Spring Harbour Laboratory in New York.
"It was amazing to find it all," said Alex Gann, editorial director at Cold Spring Harbour Laboratory Press, who made the discovery with his colleague Jan Witkowski. "It was only when we were going through it that we realised the signficance of what we had found."
Among the newly found documents are 34 mostly handwritten letters between Crick and his friend and rival, Maurice Wilkins, who worked at King's College London alongside X-ray crystallographer Rosalind Franklin. Eleven of the letters span the period 1951 to 1953, when the two groups were racing to decipher the structure of DNA.
Wilkins began studying DNA with X-rays in 1950, but a year later Franklin arrived at King's and without his prior knowledge was put in charge of the research. The relationship between the two was so fraught they barely spoke. At Cambridge, Watson and Crick took a different approach to DNA, using theory to work out its stucture.
Relations between the two teams took a turn for the worst in November 1951 when Watson visited London to hear Franklin describe her latest results. He returned to Cambridge and with Crick promptly built a model of DNA based on her data. The two then invited the King's group to come and see the "clever thing" they had made. As soon as Franklin saw the model – a triple helix – she knew it was wrong. Watson had made a serious error.
The Cambridge team's behaviour caused an immediate rift between the two groups. The King's group wanted to share their work in a spirit of openness, but feared being beaten to the prize. According to most accounts, Watson and Crick were ordered to stop working on DNA after a quiet chat between William Bragg, head of the Cavendish Lab at Cambridge, and John Randall, his counterpart at King's.
Two of the new letters shed fresh light on the fallout. On 11 December 1951, Wilkins wrote an official letter to Crick requesting the Cambridge team stop working on DNA. But the same day, he wrote a second, less formal letter, stating: "This is just to say how bloody browned off I am entirely and how rotten I feel about it all and how entirely friendly I am (though it may possibly appear differently). We are really between forces which may grind all of us into little pieces. I had to restrain Randall from writing to Bragg complaining about your behaviour."
Crick's reply on 13 December was characteristically breezy. He pointed out that Wilkins was close to solving one of the "key problems in biomolecular structure", and ended the letter: " ... so cheer up and take it from us that even if we kicked you in the pants it was between friends. We hope our burglary will at least produce a united front in your group."
In January 1953, Watson and Crick were back on the DNA problem and hoped to visit London for Franklin's last talk on DNA before leaving the laboratory. In a confused and awkward letter, Wilkins wrote to Crick, suggesting they stay away. "Let's have some talks afterwards when the air is a little clearer. I hope the smell of witchcraft will soon be getting out of our eyes."
The "witchcraft" line referred to Franklin's imminent departure.
A few months later, both teams published their landmark papers on the structure of DNA in Nature. Another letter to Crick, written soon after, reveals Wilkins's exasperation that Franklin had not discovered the double helix sooner. "To think that Rosie had all the 3D data for nine months and wouldn't fit a helix to it and I was taking her word for it that the data was anti-helical. Christ," Wilkins wrote.
He shared the Nobel prize with Watson and Crick in 1962, whereas – controversially – Franklin was overlooked.
The correspondence, which also covers Crick's doomed attempt to write a book and fears that he might leave the UK for America, is being digitised and will be available at the Cold Spring Harbour Laboratory archive.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2010/ ... ncis-crick
Newly found letters between Francis Crick and Maurice Wilkins illuminate the race to determine the structure of DNA
Ian Sample, science correspondent guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 29 September 2010 18.01 BST
A cache of missing letters, postcards and other documents belonging to Francis Crick, the scientist who helped crack the structure of DNA in the 1950s, has been discovered by researchers in America.
The nine archive boxes of lost correspondence include letters that reveal the exasperation and strained relationships at the heart of one of the greatest discoveries of modern science.
Crick died in 2004. Almost all of his early correspondence was thought to have been thrown away by an over-efficient secretary at Cambridge University, where Crick and James Watson created the first double helix model of DNA in 1953.
A report in the journal Nature reveals that the letters were not discarded, but had become mixed up with papers belonging to another scientist, Sydney Brenner, who shared an office with Crick for 20 years and recently donated his own archive materials to the library at Cold Spring Harbour Laboratory in New York.
"It was amazing to find it all," said Alex Gann, editorial director at Cold Spring Harbour Laboratory Press, who made the discovery with his colleague Jan Witkowski. "It was only when we were going through it that we realised the signficance of what we had found."
Among the newly found documents are 34 mostly handwritten letters between Crick and his friend and rival, Maurice Wilkins, who worked at King's College London alongside X-ray crystallographer Rosalind Franklin. Eleven of the letters span the period 1951 to 1953, when the two groups were racing to decipher the structure of DNA.
Wilkins began studying DNA with X-rays in 1950, but a year later Franklin arrived at King's and without his prior knowledge was put in charge of the research. The relationship between the two was so fraught they barely spoke. At Cambridge, Watson and Crick took a different approach to DNA, using theory to work out its stucture.
Relations between the two teams took a turn for the worst in November 1951 when Watson visited London to hear Franklin describe her latest results. He returned to Cambridge and with Crick promptly built a model of DNA based on her data. The two then invited the King's group to come and see the "clever thing" they had made. As soon as Franklin saw the model – a triple helix – she knew it was wrong. Watson had made a serious error.
The Cambridge team's behaviour caused an immediate rift between the two groups. The King's group wanted to share their work in a spirit of openness, but feared being beaten to the prize. According to most accounts, Watson and Crick were ordered to stop working on DNA after a quiet chat between William Bragg, head of the Cavendish Lab at Cambridge, and John Randall, his counterpart at King's.
Two of the new letters shed fresh light on the fallout. On 11 December 1951, Wilkins wrote an official letter to Crick requesting the Cambridge team stop working on DNA. But the same day, he wrote a second, less formal letter, stating: "This is just to say how bloody browned off I am entirely and how rotten I feel about it all and how entirely friendly I am (though it may possibly appear differently). We are really between forces which may grind all of us into little pieces. I had to restrain Randall from writing to Bragg complaining about your behaviour."
Crick's reply on 13 December was characteristically breezy. He pointed out that Wilkins was close to solving one of the "key problems in biomolecular structure", and ended the letter: " ... so cheer up and take it from us that even if we kicked you in the pants it was between friends. We hope our burglary will at least produce a united front in your group."
In January 1953, Watson and Crick were back on the DNA problem and hoped to visit London for Franklin's last talk on DNA before leaving the laboratory. In a confused and awkward letter, Wilkins wrote to Crick, suggesting they stay away. "Let's have some talks afterwards when the air is a little clearer. I hope the smell of witchcraft will soon be getting out of our eyes."
The "witchcraft" line referred to Franklin's imminent departure.
A few months later, both teams published their landmark papers on the structure of DNA in Nature. Another letter to Crick, written soon after, reveals Wilkins's exasperation that Franklin had not discovered the double helix sooner. "To think that Rosie had all the 3D data for nine months and wouldn't fit a helix to it and I was taking her word for it that the data was anti-helical. Christ," Wilkins wrote.
He shared the Nobel prize with Watson and Crick in 1962, whereas – controversially – Franklin was overlooked.
The correspondence, which also covers Crick's doomed attempt to write a book and fears that he might leave the UK for America, is being digitised and will be available at the Cold Spring Harbour Laboratory archive.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2010/ ... ncis-crick
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Parisian flat containing €2.1 million painting lay untouched for 70 years
For 70 years the Parisian apartment had been left uninhabited, under lock and key, the rent faithfully paid but no hint of what was inside.
By Henry Samuel in Paris
Published: 7:49PM BST 04 Oct 2010
Behind the door, under a thick layer of dusk lay a treasure trove of turn-of-the-century objects including a painting by the 19th century Italian artist Giovanni Boldini.
The woman who owned the flat had left for the south of France before the Second World War and never returned.
But when she died recently aged 91, experts were tasked with drawing up an inventory of her possessions and homed in on the flat near the Trinité church in Paris between the Pigalle red light district and Opera.
Entering the untouched, cobweb-filled flat in Paris' 9th arrondissement, one expert said it was like stumbling into the castle of Sleeping Beauty, where time had stood still since 1900. 8)
"There was a smell of old dust," said Olivier Choppin-Janvry, who made the discovery. Walking under high wooden ceilings, past an old wood stove and stone sink in the kitchen, he spotted a stuffed ostrich and a Mickey Mouse toy dating from before the war, as well as an exquisite dressing table.
But he said his heart missed a beat when he caught sight of a stunning tableau of a woman in a pink muslin evening dress.
The painting was by Boldini and the subject a beautiful Frenchwoman who turned out to be the artist's former muse and whose granddaughter it was who had left the flat uninhabited for more than half a century.
The muse was Marthe de Florian, an actress with a long list of ardent admirers, whose fervent love letters she kept wrapped neatly in ribbon and were still on the premises. Among the admirers was the 72nd prime minister of France, George Clemenceau, but also Boldini.
The expert had a hunch the painting was by Boldini, but could find no record of the painting. "No reference book dedicated to Boldini mentioned the tableau, which was never exhibited," said Marc Ottavi, the art specialist he consulted about the work.
When Mr Choppin-Janvry found a visiting card with a scribbled love note from Boldini, he knew he had struck gold. "We had the link and I was sure at that moment that it was indeed a very fine Boldini".
He finally found a reference to the work in a book by the artist's widow, which said it was painted in 1898 when Miss de Florian was 24.
The starting price for the painting was €300,000 but it rocketed as ten bidders vyed for the historic work. Finally it went under the hammer for €2.1 million, a world record for the artist.
"It was a magic moment. One could see that the buyer loved the painting; he paid the price of passion," said Mr Ottavi.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldne ... years.html
For 70 years the Parisian apartment had been left uninhabited, under lock and key, the rent faithfully paid but no hint of what was inside.
By Henry Samuel in Paris
Published: 7:49PM BST 04 Oct 2010
Behind the door, under a thick layer of dusk lay a treasure trove of turn-of-the-century objects including a painting by the 19th century Italian artist Giovanni Boldini.
The woman who owned the flat had left for the south of France before the Second World War and never returned.
But when she died recently aged 91, experts were tasked with drawing up an inventory of her possessions and homed in on the flat near the Trinité church in Paris between the Pigalle red light district and Opera.
Entering the untouched, cobweb-filled flat in Paris' 9th arrondissement, one expert said it was like stumbling into the castle of Sleeping Beauty, where time had stood still since 1900. 8)
"There was a smell of old dust," said Olivier Choppin-Janvry, who made the discovery. Walking under high wooden ceilings, past an old wood stove and stone sink in the kitchen, he spotted a stuffed ostrich and a Mickey Mouse toy dating from before the war, as well as an exquisite dressing table.
But he said his heart missed a beat when he caught sight of a stunning tableau of a woman in a pink muslin evening dress.
The painting was by Boldini and the subject a beautiful Frenchwoman who turned out to be the artist's former muse and whose granddaughter it was who had left the flat uninhabited for more than half a century.
The muse was Marthe de Florian, an actress with a long list of ardent admirers, whose fervent love letters she kept wrapped neatly in ribbon and were still on the premises. Among the admirers was the 72nd prime minister of France, George Clemenceau, but also Boldini.
The expert had a hunch the painting was by Boldini, but could find no record of the painting. "No reference book dedicated to Boldini mentioned the tableau, which was never exhibited," said Marc Ottavi, the art specialist he consulted about the work.
When Mr Choppin-Janvry found a visiting card with a scribbled love note from Boldini, he knew he had struck gold. "We had the link and I was sure at that moment that it was indeed a very fine Boldini".
He finally found a reference to the work in a book by the artist's widow, which said it was painted in 1898 when Miss de Florian was 24.
The starting price for the painting was €300,000 but it rocketed as ten bidders vyed for the historic work. Finally it went under the hammer for €2.1 million, a world record for the artist.
"It was a magic moment. One could see that the buyer loved the painting; he paid the price of passion," said Mr Ottavi.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldne ... years.html
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- 54,631
Woman reunited with diamond ring she flushed down toilet two years ago
A woman was reunited with diamond ring two years after it was accidentally flushed down toilet after hiring waste firm to sift through 12,000 gallons of sewage.
Published: 7:00AM GMT 05 Nov 2010
The company put a camera in to the cesspit tank, filtered the waste and even sent a brave worker into the tank with a metal detector to help Joan Speirs.
But by an astonishing co-incidence, an employee from the same small family firm stumbled across the ring more than two years later at a sewage works and it has now been returned to its delighted rightful owner.
Mrs Spiers, 67, Conservative leader of Reigate and Banstead Council, in Surrey, was at the Charlwood Hotel, near Gatwick, when she lost the antique gold ring, set with a valuable certified diamond and a dozen smaller diamonds.
Julie French, who directs Dorking-based waste disposal company Clear Master with her husband, Colin, said: "She was understandably distraught. The ring was worth a significant amount of money but it was also of great emotional value because it was given to her by her late husband.
"We did everything we could. We emptied the sewage tank and put a camera into it to see if the ring had got lodged anywhere.
"We even sent a guy into the tank with a metal detector.
"We took out 12,000 gallons of sewage and put it through a filter we had built specially.
"We got permission to empty the tank at a Thames Water site and put it through the sewage works, hoping that would filter it out, but we still didn't find it."
The company, which has just eight employees, was working on a contract to clear out a channel at the same works two and a half years later when worker Lloyd Hampshire saw the gem glinting through the muck.
Mrs French said: "He took it in the shower with him to rinse it off and brought it into the office.
"My husband was the only person who had seen the original photo of the lost ring and recognised it immediately. Two of the smaller diamonds had fallen out but apart from that, it was just in need of a good clean.
"We verified it was the same ring then handed it over to Cllr Spiers, who was emotional to say the least. She had completely given up any hope of seeing it again.
"It gave us all a warm feeling because we knew how much it meant to her.
"She has had it professionally cleaned, because of where it had been for so long, and is keeping it in a much safer place now."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstop ... s-ago.html
A woman was reunited with diamond ring two years after it was accidentally flushed down toilet after hiring waste firm to sift through 12,000 gallons of sewage.
Published: 7:00AM GMT 05 Nov 2010
The company put a camera in to the cesspit tank, filtered the waste and even sent a brave worker into the tank with a metal detector to help Joan Speirs.
But by an astonishing co-incidence, an employee from the same small family firm stumbled across the ring more than two years later at a sewage works and it has now been returned to its delighted rightful owner.
Mrs Spiers, 67, Conservative leader of Reigate and Banstead Council, in Surrey, was at the Charlwood Hotel, near Gatwick, when she lost the antique gold ring, set with a valuable certified diamond and a dozen smaller diamonds.
Julie French, who directs Dorking-based waste disposal company Clear Master with her husband, Colin, said: "She was understandably distraught. The ring was worth a significant amount of money but it was also of great emotional value because it was given to her by her late husband.
"We did everything we could. We emptied the sewage tank and put a camera into it to see if the ring had got lodged anywhere.
"We even sent a guy into the tank with a metal detector.
"We took out 12,000 gallons of sewage and put it through a filter we had built specially.
"We got permission to empty the tank at a Thames Water site and put it through the sewage works, hoping that would filter it out, but we still didn't find it."
The company, which has just eight employees, was working on a contract to clear out a channel at the same works two and a half years later when worker Lloyd Hampshire saw the gem glinting through the muck.
Mrs French said: "He took it in the shower with him to rinse it off and brought it into the office.
"My husband was the only person who had seen the original photo of the lost ring and recognised it immediately. Two of the smaller diamonds had fallen out but apart from that, it was just in need of a good clean.
"We verified it was the same ring then handed it over to Cllr Spiers, who was emotional to say the least. She had completely given up any hope of seeing it again.
"It gave us all a warm feeling because we knew how much it meant to her.
"She has had it professionally cleaned, because of where it had been for so long, and is keeping it in a much safer place now."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstop ... s-ago.html
JamesWhitehead
Piffle Prospector
- Joined
- Aug 2, 2001
- Messages
- 14,208
"She has had it professionally cleaned, because of where it had been for so long, and is keeping it in a much safer place now."
Her front bottom this time?
Her front bottom this time?
- Joined
- Aug 7, 2001
- Messages
- 54,631
Photos taken by the enemy in Second World War shows lost Tudor garden
Photographs taken by the Luftwaffe on a reconnaissance mission during the Second World War have revealed a lost Tudor garden on National Trust land.
By Louise Gray, Environment Correspondent
Published: 12:08PM GMT 06 Nov 2010
Photographs taken by the Luftwaffe on a bombing reconnaissance mission during the Second World War have revealed a lost Tudor garden on National Trust land.
The unusual ‘labyrinth’ design in the grounds of Lyveden New Bield in Northamptonshire had lain forgotten for 350 years.
It only discovered after gardeners studied photographs taken by the enemy in the Battle of Britain.
They noticed a series of strange concentric circles, measuring 400 feet across, that looked like a ‘labyrinth’, a popular garden feature in Elizabethan times.
National Trust experts also believe the photograph, taken in 1944, shows the last remains of an Elizabethan fruit garden, with a series of regular planting holes visible.
The finding has been described as one of the most important garden discoveries of recent times.
Lyveden New Bield has always been shrouded in mystery since the Tudor manor was left incomplete by Sir Thomas Tresham in 1605.
Chris Gallagher, National Trust gardens and parks curator, was studying photos at the United States National Archive at Maryland in Baltimore to find out more when he found the picture.
“We checked the database and found the photo existed but when we ordered up the image it revealed far more than we ever expected,” he said.
"Not only did it expose the remnants of the original circular design – set within what Sir Thomas Tresham, who created the garden, then called his 'moated orchard' – you can also make out the vestiges of a regular array of planting holes, which we have taken to be the last remains of an Elizabethan fruit garden."
The discovery has led to the garden being upgraded by English Heritage to the top Grade I listing, putting it on a par with great gardens such as Stourhead and Studley Royal.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/8112577 ... arden.html
Photographs taken by the Luftwaffe on a reconnaissance mission during the Second World War have revealed a lost Tudor garden on National Trust land.
By Louise Gray, Environment Correspondent
Published: 12:08PM GMT 06 Nov 2010
Photographs taken by the Luftwaffe on a bombing reconnaissance mission during the Second World War have revealed a lost Tudor garden on National Trust land.
The unusual ‘labyrinth’ design in the grounds of Lyveden New Bield in Northamptonshire had lain forgotten for 350 years.
It only discovered after gardeners studied photographs taken by the enemy in the Battle of Britain.
They noticed a series of strange concentric circles, measuring 400 feet across, that looked like a ‘labyrinth’, a popular garden feature in Elizabethan times.
National Trust experts also believe the photograph, taken in 1944, shows the last remains of an Elizabethan fruit garden, with a series of regular planting holes visible.
The finding has been described as one of the most important garden discoveries of recent times.
Lyveden New Bield has always been shrouded in mystery since the Tudor manor was left incomplete by Sir Thomas Tresham in 1605.
Chris Gallagher, National Trust gardens and parks curator, was studying photos at the United States National Archive at Maryland in Baltimore to find out more when he found the picture.
“We checked the database and found the photo existed but when we ordered up the image it revealed far more than we ever expected,” he said.
"Not only did it expose the remnants of the original circular design – set within what Sir Thomas Tresham, who created the garden, then called his 'moated orchard' – you can also make out the vestiges of a regular array of planting holes, which we have taken to be the last remains of an Elizabethan fruit garden."
The discovery has led to the garden being upgraded by English Heritage to the top Grade I listing, putting it on a par with great gardens such as Stourhead and Studley Royal.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/8112577 ... arden.html
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- Aug 7, 2001
- Messages
- 54,631
Collector finds junk stall bugle was played by his own grandfather at the Battle of the Somme
By Lucy Thornton 19/11/2010
Blowing the battered bugle, old soldier Maurice Green sounds a note that echoes poignantly down the years.
His hero grandfather sounded the charge on this very instrument before losing his life in the Battle of the Somme. Now fate and a fiver have combined to bring the bugle back to his family.
Incredibly, retired engineer and former Army man Maurice, 73, came across his heirloom piled on a junk stall while browsing a local market for military medals.
He handed over £5 and, when he cleaned off all the grime, was astonished to see the Army service number of the bugler it had been issued to during the First World War. It was Daniel Clay - his grandad.
On July 1, 1916, Private Clay used it to sound the charge as 703 of the 8th Battalion York and Lancaster Regiment leapt from their trenches. All but 68 men perished, including Pte Clay, 26, whose body was never found. His bugle was also believed lost on the battlefield - until now.
Grandson Maurice said: "It is an unbelievable story. I went to the market to look for medals from the battalions I served alongside.
"I spotted this battered old bugle on a bric-a-brac stand. It was as black as soot, but I noticed its Army service number had the same first three digits as my grandad's.
"I couldn't see the last two digits, but I wondered if it could be the bugle my grandad had played at the Somme. So I cleaned it and was stunned when the last two digits corresponded to his Army service number. I'm convinced this was the one he had in the trenches."
Maurice, from Rotherham, South Yorks, believes one of the survivors retrieved it from the battlefield.
He added: "The important thing is it has ended up back in my grandad's family, where it belongs." Pte Clay's bugle was played at the recent Remembrance Day service in Rotherham.
Read more: http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/weird-worl ... z15jWQyMif
Version with photos:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... Somme.html
By Lucy Thornton 19/11/2010
Blowing the battered bugle, old soldier Maurice Green sounds a note that echoes poignantly down the years.
His hero grandfather sounded the charge on this very instrument before losing his life in the Battle of the Somme. Now fate and a fiver have combined to bring the bugle back to his family.
Incredibly, retired engineer and former Army man Maurice, 73, came across his heirloom piled on a junk stall while browsing a local market for military medals.
He handed over £5 and, when he cleaned off all the grime, was astonished to see the Army service number of the bugler it had been issued to during the First World War. It was Daniel Clay - his grandad.
On July 1, 1916, Private Clay used it to sound the charge as 703 of the 8th Battalion York and Lancaster Regiment leapt from their trenches. All but 68 men perished, including Pte Clay, 26, whose body was never found. His bugle was also believed lost on the battlefield - until now.
Grandson Maurice said: "It is an unbelievable story. I went to the market to look for medals from the battalions I served alongside.
"I spotted this battered old bugle on a bric-a-brac stand. It was as black as soot, but I noticed its Army service number had the same first three digits as my grandad's.
"I couldn't see the last two digits, but I wondered if it could be the bugle my grandad had played at the Somme. So I cleaned it and was stunned when the last two digits corresponded to his Army service number. I'm convinced this was the one he had in the trenches."
Maurice, from Rotherham, South Yorks, believes one of the survivors retrieved it from the battlefield.
He added: "The important thing is it has ended up back in my grandad's family, where it belongs." Pte Clay's bugle was played at the recent Remembrance Day service in Rotherham.
Read more: http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/weird-worl ... z15jWQyMif
Version with photos:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... Somme.html
- Joined
- Aug 7, 2001
- Messages
- 54,631
74 year overdue library book returned
A 95-year-old American woman has returned a library book 74 years after her husband borrowed it and faced a late return fine of $2,700 (£1,700).
5:53PM GMT 09 Dec 2010
Hazel Severson, 95, of Sacramento says a friend found a book that Mrs Severson's late husband had borrowed from an Amador County library in 1936 while sorting through things for a garage sale.
Mrs Severson told The Sacramento Bee newspaper that she and her husband Howard were newly-weds back when he checked out the hardback, Seaplane Solo, about Sir Francis Chichester's 1930 solo flight across the Tasman Sea.
Luckily for Mrs Severson, the library did not charge her the fee, though it did accept a small donation when she finally returned the book on Oct. 13.
Librarian Laura Einstadter says the library was just happy to get the book back.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstop ... urned.html
I've read that book! (Well, not that exact copy, obviously. It was probably a later edition, after Chichester again hit the headlines for sailing alone round the world in 1967.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Chichester )
A 95-year-old American woman has returned a library book 74 years after her husband borrowed it and faced a late return fine of $2,700 (£1,700).
5:53PM GMT 09 Dec 2010
Hazel Severson, 95, of Sacramento says a friend found a book that Mrs Severson's late husband had borrowed from an Amador County library in 1936 while sorting through things for a garage sale.
Mrs Severson told The Sacramento Bee newspaper that she and her husband Howard were newly-weds back when he checked out the hardback, Seaplane Solo, about Sir Francis Chichester's 1930 solo flight across the Tasman Sea.
Luckily for Mrs Severson, the library did not charge her the fee, though it did accept a small donation when she finally returned the book on Oct. 13.
Librarian Laura Einstadter says the library was just happy to get the book back.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstop ... urned.html
I've read that book! (Well, not that exact copy, obviously. It was probably a later edition, after Chichester again hit the headlines for sailing alone round the world in 1967.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Chichester )
- Joined
- Aug 7, 2001
- Messages
- 54,631
It's a miracle: Boy George returns 300-year-old stolen picture of Christ after bishop spots it on star's wall while watching TV
Last updated at 9:05 AM on 21st January 2011
For more than 25 years it formed part of Boy George’s art collection.
But after being told that the icon of Christ had been stolen from the Orthodox Church of Cyprus, the pop singer has handed it back.
Incredibly, the church bishop had seen the battered painting hanging from the wall of the singer's home while watching a documentary on him on Dutch TV.
George, who of course has famously sung about miracles and churches with 'poisoned minds', had bought the 300-year-old piece in 1985 without knowing it had been snatched from a church during the 1974 Turkish invasion.
But Bishop Porfyrios, the Cyprus Orthodox Church’s representative in Brussels, made contact with him after spotting it above his fireplace at the gothic mansion in Hampstead, north London
Today, the 49-year-old singer handed it over to the cleric at nearby St Anagyre church.
The singer told the BBC: ‘I’m happy it is going back to its original, rightful home. I’ve always been a friend of Cyprus and have looked after the icon for 26 years.’
In return, the bishop gave him a modern version of the Jesus Christ Pantokrator painting as a token of gratitude and ‘with the wish that others soon follow his example'.
Thousands of religious artefacts went missing from northern Cyprus following Turkey’s 1974 invasion, which left the island’s Greek and Turkish speakers divided by partition.
Many relics have since appeared on the international art market and the Cyprus Church has been actively seeking to repatriate them.
Bishop Porfyrios, who caught only a glimpse of the gold-leaf image during the show he watched, delved deeper and discovered it had been plundered from the church of St Charalambous in Neo Chorio, near Kithrea.
After verifying this with the priest from St Charalambous, he contacted the singer and told him about the icon’s provenance and he was happy to return it to its original owners without payment.
Bishop Porfyrios said of George: ‘He bought it from an art dealer in 1985, but did not know it came from occupied Cyprus, and it was bought in good faith.
‘After our contact he gave it back to Cyprus with pleasure’
George added: ‘I look forward to seeing the icon on display in Cyprus for the moment and finally to the Church of St Charalambos from where it was illegally stolen.’
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... z1BfWFjgbK
Last updated at 9:05 AM on 21st January 2011
For more than 25 years it formed part of Boy George’s art collection.
But after being told that the icon of Christ had been stolen from the Orthodox Church of Cyprus, the pop singer has handed it back.
Incredibly, the church bishop had seen the battered painting hanging from the wall of the singer's home while watching a documentary on him on Dutch TV.
George, who of course has famously sung about miracles and churches with 'poisoned minds', had bought the 300-year-old piece in 1985 without knowing it had been snatched from a church during the 1974 Turkish invasion.
But Bishop Porfyrios, the Cyprus Orthodox Church’s representative in Brussels, made contact with him after spotting it above his fireplace at the gothic mansion in Hampstead, north London
Today, the 49-year-old singer handed it over to the cleric at nearby St Anagyre church.
The singer told the BBC: ‘I’m happy it is going back to its original, rightful home. I’ve always been a friend of Cyprus and have looked after the icon for 26 years.’
In return, the bishop gave him a modern version of the Jesus Christ Pantokrator painting as a token of gratitude and ‘with the wish that others soon follow his example'.
Thousands of religious artefacts went missing from northern Cyprus following Turkey’s 1974 invasion, which left the island’s Greek and Turkish speakers divided by partition.
Many relics have since appeared on the international art market and the Cyprus Church has been actively seeking to repatriate them.
Bishop Porfyrios, who caught only a glimpse of the gold-leaf image during the show he watched, delved deeper and discovered it had been plundered from the church of St Charalambous in Neo Chorio, near Kithrea.
After verifying this with the priest from St Charalambous, he contacted the singer and told him about the icon’s provenance and he was happy to return it to its original owners without payment.
Bishop Porfyrios said of George: ‘He bought it from an art dealer in 1985, but did not know it came from occupied Cyprus, and it was bought in good faith.
‘After our contact he gave it back to Cyprus with pleasure’
George added: ‘I look forward to seeing the icon on display in Cyprus for the moment and finally to the Church of St Charalambos from where it was illegally stolen.’
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... z1BfWFjgbK
JamesWhitehead
Piffle Prospector
- Joined
- Aug 2, 2001
- Messages
- 14,208
Bishop Porfyrios: Much as I'd love to stick around and bless your taramosalata, I find that tonight I am watching Boy George on the television - again! :shock:
Excerpt from Father Tzatziki, episode 23
Excerpt from Father Tzatziki, episode 23
Mythopoeika
I am a meat popsicle
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- Location
- Inside a starship, watching puny humans from afar
Yeah...good point...what was the bishop doing watching a program about Boy George? Puzzling.
To coin a phrase, it's unbishoply.
To coin a phrase, it's unbishoply.
ramonmercado
CyberPunk
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- Aug 19, 2003
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- 58,311
- Location
- Eblana
ramonmercado said:
- Joined
- Aug 7, 2001
- Messages
- 54,631
Unknown painting by Walter Sickert discovered in private collection
A previously unknown painting by the eminent impressionist Walter Sickert has emerged from a private collection, to the amazement of art historians.
By Roya Nikkhah, Arts Correspondent 9:15AM GMT 20 Feb 2011
The Blind Sea Captain, an oil painting depicting a blind man being helped by an elderly woman to walk along a harbour, is expected to fetch up to £60,000 when auctioned by Bonhams at a sale of 20th-century British art in London on March 9.
The picture recently emerged from a private collection in Scotland, inherited by the seller from her grandfather.
It is thought to have been painted during the summer of 1914 in Dieppe, on France's north coast, where Sickert lived from 1899 until 1911 and where he continued to visit until returning to live there in 1919.
Until The Blind Sea Captain emerged a few months ago, an unfinished sketch in oil on canvas dated 1912 and known as The Old Soldier, was previously thought to be the sum of Sickert's work on the subject of disability.
The newly discovered painting has been hailed as one of the finest examples of Sickert's proficiency as a master of mood and allusion.
Wendy Baron, an art historian and the author of Sickert: Paintings and Drawings, said: "The Blind Sea Captain gives an imaginary glimpse into the lives of a man broken by blindness who, but for the devotion of his old mother or wife, would be destined for the workhouse.
"Until it emerged a few months ago, I had found nothing during 58 years spent studying Sickert's paintings to suggest that he ever returned to this subject. It's rediscovery is thus especially exciting."
Famous for his paintings of nudes, including a series of controversial pictures entitled The Camden Murder, which was inspired by the murder of a prostitute in 1907, Sickert, who died in 1942 aged 81, is considered one of the most important figures in the transition of Impressionism to modernism in the 20th century.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/art/ ... ction.html
Sickert is better known to some as Jack the Ripper (according to novelist Patricia Cornwell...
)http://www.forteantimes.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=568402#568402
A previously unknown painting by the eminent impressionist Walter Sickert has emerged from a private collection, to the amazement of art historians.
By Roya Nikkhah, Arts Correspondent 9:15AM GMT 20 Feb 2011
The Blind Sea Captain, an oil painting depicting a blind man being helped by an elderly woman to walk along a harbour, is expected to fetch up to £60,000 when auctioned by Bonhams at a sale of 20th-century British art in London on March 9.
The picture recently emerged from a private collection in Scotland, inherited by the seller from her grandfather.
It is thought to have been painted during the summer of 1914 in Dieppe, on France's north coast, where Sickert lived from 1899 until 1911 and where he continued to visit until returning to live there in 1919.
Until The Blind Sea Captain emerged a few months ago, an unfinished sketch in oil on canvas dated 1912 and known as The Old Soldier, was previously thought to be the sum of Sickert's work on the subject of disability.
The newly discovered painting has been hailed as one of the finest examples of Sickert's proficiency as a master of mood and allusion.
Wendy Baron, an art historian and the author of Sickert: Paintings and Drawings, said: "The Blind Sea Captain gives an imaginary glimpse into the lives of a man broken by blindness who, but for the devotion of his old mother or wife, would be destined for the workhouse.
"Until it emerged a few months ago, I had found nothing during 58 years spent studying Sickert's paintings to suggest that he ever returned to this subject. It's rediscovery is thus especially exciting."
Famous for his paintings of nudes, including a series of controversial pictures entitled The Camden Murder, which was inspired by the murder of a prostitute in 1907, Sickert, who died in 1942 aged 81, is considered one of the most important figures in the transition of Impressionism to modernism in the 20th century.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/art/ ... ction.html
Sickert is better known to some as Jack the Ripper (according to novelist Patricia Cornwell...
)http://www.forteantimes.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=568402#568402
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- Aug 7, 2001
- Messages
- 54,631
Half a dodo found in museum drawer
Staff at Grant Museum surprised to discover remains of extinct bird amid mass of crocodile bones during move to new home
Maev Kennedy guardian.co.uk, Monday 21 February 2011 18.14 GMT Article history
Half a dodo has turned up in an Edwardian wooden box in a drawer at one of Britain's oldest natural history collections.
Not much surprises the staff at the Grant Museum, where the contents include an old sweet jar full to the brim with pickled baby moles, their paws pressed pathetically against the glass, and the skull and antlers of an extinct species of giant deer which some academics bought straight off the wall of an Irish pub.
However, even they were a little startled when the dodo turned up, stored with a mass of crocodile bones.
"They do have common characteristics, crocodiles and birds," Jack Ashby, the museum's learning access manager, said. "It was an understandable mistake."
The dodo remains emerged as the Grant, part of University College London, moved its 70,000-item collection to a new home in an Edwardian former medical library.
It may look like a collection of blackened bones, but the dodo is an exceptional find. The afterlife of the disastrously delicious flightless bird in museums is almost as tragic as its extinction in its native Mauritius in the 17th century.
No complete specimen survives, although in the 19th century at least two were destroyed by curators who decided they were in unacceptably poor condition, including the one at the Natural History Museum in Oxford that inspired Lewis Carroll's dodo in Alice in Wonderland.
The bones will be displayed alongside another treasure of the collection, the Grant's quagga – an extinct South African relative of the horse, resembling a zebra. The old catalogue said the collection held two zebras: it turned out that one was a donkey, and the other was the quagga, one of only seven almost complete skeletons in the world. (Almost complete because it lost a left hind leg, probably when the collection was moved to a Welsh slate mine during the Blitz.)
The catalogue has been tormenting the curators: the oldest entries merely say what the object is, not how it got there. College legend says their Galapagos tortoise came back on the Beagle with Charles Darwin, but they can't prove it. The cut marks on the inside of the shell strongly suggest the rest of the poor creature went into the stew pot on board.
The Grant, founded in 1827 as a teaching collection at UCL, is the last university zoological museum in London, and includes many items that were orphaned when their original homes closed. It still holds many specimens prepared by Robert Edmond Grant, the first professor of zoology and comparative anatomy in England.
etc...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2011/ ... eum-drawer
Staff at Grant Museum surprised to discover remains of extinct bird amid mass of crocodile bones during move to new home
Maev Kennedy guardian.co.uk, Monday 21 February 2011 18.14 GMT Article history
Half a dodo has turned up in an Edwardian wooden box in a drawer at one of Britain's oldest natural history collections.
Not much surprises the staff at the Grant Museum, where the contents include an old sweet jar full to the brim with pickled baby moles, their paws pressed pathetically against the glass, and the skull and antlers of an extinct species of giant deer which some academics bought straight off the wall of an Irish pub.
However, even they were a little startled when the dodo turned up, stored with a mass of crocodile bones.
"They do have common characteristics, crocodiles and birds," Jack Ashby, the museum's learning access manager, said. "It was an understandable mistake."
The dodo remains emerged as the Grant, part of University College London, moved its 70,000-item collection to a new home in an Edwardian former medical library.
It may look like a collection of blackened bones, but the dodo is an exceptional find. The afterlife of the disastrously delicious flightless bird in museums is almost as tragic as its extinction in its native Mauritius in the 17th century.
No complete specimen survives, although in the 19th century at least two were destroyed by curators who decided they were in unacceptably poor condition, including the one at the Natural History Museum in Oxford that inspired Lewis Carroll's dodo in Alice in Wonderland.
The bones will be displayed alongside another treasure of the collection, the Grant's quagga – an extinct South African relative of the horse, resembling a zebra. The old catalogue said the collection held two zebras: it turned out that one was a donkey, and the other was the quagga, one of only seven almost complete skeletons in the world. (Almost complete because it lost a left hind leg, probably when the collection was moved to a Welsh slate mine during the Blitz.)
The catalogue has been tormenting the curators: the oldest entries merely say what the object is, not how it got there. College legend says their Galapagos tortoise came back on the Beagle with Charles Darwin, but they can't prove it. The cut marks on the inside of the shell strongly suggest the rest of the poor creature went into the stew pot on board.
The Grant, founded in 1827 as a teaching collection at UCL, is the last university zoological museum in London, and includes many items that were orphaned when their original homes closed. It still holds many specimens prepared by Robert Edmond Grant, the first professor of zoology and comparative anatomy in England.
etc...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2011/ ... eum-drawer
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Long-lost Frederic Chopin letters recovered by museum
Six letters written by Frederic Chopin, thought to be lost in 1939, have been found and donated to a Warsaw museum dedicated to the Polish composer.
The letters, written by Chopin to his parents and sisters between 1845 and 1848, were believed lost after the outbreak of World War II.
After it emerged in 2003 that they still existed in a private collection, moves were made to secure them.
Chopin was born in Poland in 1810 but spent half of his life in France.
According to museum curator Alicja Knast, the letters were last displayed in public in Poland in 1932 and were still confirmed as being in Warsaw in 1939.
It is thought the letters went missing, like many other cultural artefacts, after the Nazis invaded Poland.
The museum was assisted in their recovery by Marek Keller, a Polish art dealer now based in Mexico.
He acquired them directly from their owners, whom Knast said wished to remain anonymous.
In the letters, written in Polish, Chopin describes daily life and his cello sonata in G minor, one of his few non-piano works.
The collection, which includes letters from Chopin's pupil Jane Stirling to his sister Ludwika, will be on display at the museum until 25 April.
Some of Chopin's letters were written in Nohant in central France, birthplace of his lover Amantine Dupin - aka writer George Sand.
Later this year Jeremy Irons and Sharon Stone will take part in a theatrical evening devoted to their romance at the Tuscan Sun Festival in Cortona, Italy.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-12846506
Six letters written by Frederic Chopin, thought to be lost in 1939, have been found and donated to a Warsaw museum dedicated to the Polish composer.
The letters, written by Chopin to his parents and sisters between 1845 and 1848, were believed lost after the outbreak of World War II.
After it emerged in 2003 that they still existed in a private collection, moves were made to secure them.
Chopin was born in Poland in 1810 but spent half of his life in France.
According to museum curator Alicja Knast, the letters were last displayed in public in Poland in 1932 and were still confirmed as being in Warsaw in 1939.
It is thought the letters went missing, like many other cultural artefacts, after the Nazis invaded Poland.
The museum was assisted in their recovery by Marek Keller, a Polish art dealer now based in Mexico.
He acquired them directly from their owners, whom Knast said wished to remain anonymous.
In the letters, written in Polish, Chopin describes daily life and his cello sonata in G minor, one of his few non-piano works.
The collection, which includes letters from Chopin's pupil Jane Stirling to his sister Ludwika, will be on display at the museum until 25 April.
Some of Chopin's letters were written in Nohant in central France, birthplace of his lover Amantine Dupin - aka writer George Sand.
Later this year Jeremy Irons and Sharon Stone will take part in a theatrical evening devoted to their romance at the Tuscan Sun Festival in Cortona, Italy.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-12846506